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Coding Updates



August 4, 2021



Resource update



Wondering whether a policy you are about to code is already in the dataset? In order to make it easier for you to keep track of more than 80,000 policies, we are happy to announce a new tool - the Duplicate Detector! Hopefully, this automated first check will help you in your coding and prevent duplicates in the future.

Big thanks to Abdul Ali Khan for taking the initiative and building something so user friendly!



July 27, 2021



Resource update



Wondering about the different policy types and their sub-types? In order to make it easier for you guys to sort through the different policy types, information on the policy sub-types can now be found in the Coding Guide. Hopefully this will make it a lot easier for you to quickly figure out the different options when coding.

Big thanks to Isaac Bravo for his amazing work with this!!



July 05, 2021



Resource update



Confused about health testing and health monitoring policies? Check out this updated video and two new slides on what is NOT health testing and health monitoring in the coding guide by Natalia Filkina-Spreizer and Sarah Edmonds for guidance!



July 05, 2021



Taxonomy update



Based on what governments have been doing to deal with the pandemic and many of your guys’ feedback we’ve made a couple of small changes to the taxonomy in particular with respect to:

  • Restrictions of Mass Gathering [type_mass_var] can now capture Single/All Recreational or commercial event allowed to occur with conditions
  • COVID-19 Vaccines [type_vac_cat] now provide the options Covishield (Indian-made version of AstraZeneca Serum Institute India), EpiVacCorona (EpiVakKorona; VECTOR center of virology), Unspecified Vaccines and All Vaccines
  • We’ve added ‘Negative COVID-19 tests’ as an option for External Border Restrictions [type_ext_restrict], Closure and Regulation of Schools [type_school_var], Restrictions and Regulations of Businesses [type_business_var], Restrictions and Regulations of government services [type_gov_var] and Restrictions of Mass Gatherings [type_mass_var]
  • Internal Border Restrictions [type_int_restrict] now gets its own sub type which mirrors the External Border Restrictions subtype!
  • Closure and Regulation of Schools [type_school_var] now has the options Full remote/distance learning and Partial remote/distance learning

For more detail, please see this document which outlines what this means for you.



June 10, 2021



Resource update



Want to meet other people on this project and learn what to do when governments are implementing crazy things? We’re excited to announce project-wide Coding hours for the next two months! You can refer to this link for a google docs spreadsheet of the schedule. We hope having some project-wide coding hours will help us continue to learn and grow together and double thanks to all the RAs who have volunteered to host!



May 26, 2021



Resource update



Unsure how to code a policy? @Joseph (Kwan Bo) Shim has created a great new tool that provides a model-based best ‘guess’ of a policy based on the policy description. These model-based predictions will continue to improve i) based on your feedback (reach out to Joseph or Cindy!) and ii) as the overall data becomes cleaner and cleaner. We hope this can be an additional resource to asking your fellow RAs, regional/country managers, #ra-chat etc. on your way to taxonomy mastery!



May 14, 2021



Resource update



Confused about the difference between an external and internal border restriction? Check out this great short video by Natalia Filkina-Spreizer and Sarah Edmonds which explains when to code one or the other!



May 14, 2021



Resource update



The CoronaNet RA Onboarding Guide provides a comprehensive overview of different parts of the project for new (and seasoned) RAs, spearheaded by Vanessa Zwisele.



May 14, 2021



Resource update



The CoronaNet Low State Capacity Guidelines provides a guideliens for RAs who find it difficult to find official sources in a given country because they just don’t seem to exist (including e.g. either on Overton Raw Sources Sheet or the Jataware/Starsift Raw Sources or on a given government’s official websites) due to low bureacratic governmental capacity.



May 5, 2021



Resource update



The CoronaNet ‘Other’ Policy Type Potential Miscodings sheet identifies potential policies that have been miscoded as an ‘other’ policy type.

  • @Joseph (Kwan Bo) Shim and @Irene N. Chang have created models which try to identify which policies are lilkely miscoded as well as what their best guess and second best guess for what the correct policy type should be. There are around 1000 policies that the model ‘guesses’ are miscoded

  • If each RA could take a look for your country and (i) provide feedback as to how well the models do in guessing a more appropriate policy type and (ii) correct the policy for your country as needed, that would be amazing —> this will help us refine our models to identify miscodings more generally and provide further feedback to you all!



April 20, 2021



Taxonomy update



Based on many of your guys’ feedback we’ve made a couple of small changes to the taxonomy in particular with respect to:

  • Delivery/takeaway options are now available for Bars, Retail Stores, Supermarkets/grocery stores, Pharmacies and Personal Grooming
  • There is now a text entry for ‘Retail Businesses’
  • There is now an explicit button to code when nursing homes are closed or when patients are restricted from leaving nursing homes in the Social Distancing type!
  • We’ve added options to capture suspensions and resumptions of COVID-19 rollouts
  • There are now options in target_who_gen for capturing whether a policy targets people with natural immunity, are fully vaccinated, partially vaccinated or not vaccinated against COVID-19 which are particularly important to capture for more recent policy actions.

For more detail, please see this documment which outlines what we’ve changed in more detail.



March 29, 2021



Resource update



Check out this google sheet which identifies what policies likely need to be recoded because of changes to the taxonomy for how to deal with visiting nursing homes, hospitals, prisons and cemeteries

These policies were flagged as likely needing recoding if:

  • the policy description contains the word ‘visit’ or words related to nursing homes, hospitals, prisons or cemeteries in the description and if the policy was entered before March 19 (when the taxonomy change took place)

Obviously this is not fool proof :

  • False positives: if there is a policy that is not about visiting nursing homes, hospitals, prisons or cemeteries, please put a ‘1’ in the column “This policy is not about visiting nursing homes, hospitals, prisons or cemeteries” (column M) and Cindy will remove it from the list.
  • False negatives: It is certainly possible that there are some policies that deal with visiting nursing homes, hospitals, prisons or cemeteries that do not actually have the words ‘visit’ or ‘nursing homes’, ‘hospitals’, ‘prisons’ or ‘cemeteries’ in their description. If people encounter policies that are not on the sheet that should be, please reach out to Cindy!

In general Cindy will update this sheet about once a week so you can track your progress.



March 19, 2021



Taxonomy update



We have made some changes to the taxonomy which reflect both feedback that we’ve gotten from many of you as well as the changing nature of the pandemic. In many cases, you guys were already coding many of these categories but there wasn’t clear guidance or buttons for you to click — we hope that these changes will get rid of these gray areas!

In particular we have made changes to better capture:

  • Policies that deal with visiting people
  • Policies that deal with weddings and funerals
  • Policies that deal with restrictions of mass gatherings that are allowed to occur with conditions
  • Policies that deal with elections
  • Policies that deal with takeaway and delivery in restaurants
  • Policies that deal with Public Awareness Measures for COVID-19 Vaccines

For more detail, please see this documment which outlines what we’ve changed and what this means for you in more detail.



March 19, 2021



Resource Announcement



Get involved in the missing end dates competition! Co-PI Caress Schenk has made a great short video to explain how to get started and you can find the missing end dates for your country here! You can also find additional information in the ‘How do I code end dates’ section in the coding guide and dashboard!



March 16, 2021



Taxonomy update We’ve made a small change for how to input subnational geographical targets.



Many of you have found it onerous to input in the target geographical regions when a country targets the entire country for many countries and subnational regions for some countries at the same time. E.g. country X might implement a travel restriction against 100 countries for the whole country as well as Lombardy and Wuhan in particular – travel is still allowed for the rest of China/Italy.

What we changed: After you choose the option: “One or more geographical or administrative units within one or more countries” in response to the ‘target_geog_level’ question, you now get one follow up question which asks you to choose whether:

  • This policy targets both entire countries and subnational targets for some countries
  • This policy only has subnational targets

If you choose that ‘This policy targets both entire countries and subnational targets for some countries’ , then you can for example select the 100 countries for which the policy targets the entire country first, and then the 2 countries (China and Italy) for which the policy only targets subnational regions in a second question.

How this affects you: Hopefully it is easier to input in policies when the target is both the entire country and subnational targets for some countries.



March 10, 2021



Coding goals



You’re already up to date for your country by October 1st for March 1st — great!

  • You can either then start getting your data ready until Feb 1st by June 1st or
  • You can check in with your regional/country manager to see if they need help to get other countries in the region up to date until October 1st. Still working on the October 1st by march 1st deadline? — No worries
  • Keep at it and ask for help if you need it. Once you get there, let your RM/CM know and then switch up to the goals above. 

As you’re working towards the above goals, please continue follow the priority groups for policy types which are listed on the main dashbaord (e.g. group 1 is Lockdown, Curfew and Quarantine)



February 18, 2021



Taxonomy update : We’ve added a couple of small questions to the curfew and restrictions of mass gatherings.



For Curfews

  • What we changed: We’ve noticed that some countries have different curfew times depending on the day of the week (e.g. you can’t go out after 9pm on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays but you can on the other days of the week). To capture this, we’ve added two new question: type_curfew_freq which asks you to record whether curfew times do in fact differ depending on the day of the week or not and type_curfew_day which allows you to capture the days and time of the curfew if in fact they are different. See the printed survey under the [type_sub_cat] policy for ‘Curfew’ for more info.

  • How this affects you: Note that for previous curfew policies that you coded which did not depend on the day of the week, the [type_curfew_freq] question will be filled automatically, so no need to worry about backcoding this! If you previously coded a policy for which the curfew times did differ depending on the day of the week, then you should ‘correct’ this policy given these new questions.

For restrictions of mass gatherings:

  • What we changed: We’ve added a new question that notes whether the mass gathering is for indoor, outdoor, both or not specified if the sub type is ‘All/Unspecified mass gatherings’. See the printed survey under the [type_sub_cat] policy for ‘Restrictions of Mass Gathering’ for more info.
  • How this affects you: It would be great if you could backcode these policies to capture this distinction, unfortunately there is no way to automate this, but no worries about this counting for getting the data clean and complete up to October 1st.



February 3, 2021



Resource Announcement



Finding it difficult/confusing to clean/sort through a policy history? Natalia Filkina-Spreizer and Sarah Edmonds have done a really awesome job making a new video which goes through examples of how to check if a policy history is clean and Nathan Ruhde has written some fantastic textual guidance as well. You can also find these resources in the coding guide and dashboard!



January 31, 2021



Resource Announcement



Natalia Filkina-Spreizer and Sarah Edmonds have done a great job of making a couple of short but concise videos which explain how to code and update health testing and health monitoring policies and COVID-19 vaccines. You can also find them in the dashboard and in the coding guide.

Project News



September 27, 2021




Did you ever have a question about the project and didn’t know how to ask? Are you wondering about how CoronaNet is being funded? Or about Cindy’s favorite cheese? Join CoronaNet’s first Townhall during the next weekly meeting on Wednesday, September 29, 2021, at 4:30pm (CEST) and ask about everything you ever wanted to know!

Please use this survey to pose your questions. Your question will be completely anonymous, so feel free to ask about anything!



September 13, 2021




BIG ANNOUNCEMENT! We are making some project changes in the coming weeks! Based on feedback from you in previous surveys as well as just hunkering down to think about where it makes the most sense to concentrate our efforts, we are making some changes in terms of:

  • Setting Goals for the Project with differentiated project-wide targets and more country/region-specific goal-making

  • Improving Monitoring and Feedback Mechanisms with a RA Internal Survey, RM/CM Monthly Check-Ins and more specific feedback on which policies need checking

  • Providing better support and tools for reaching these goals with data from external datasets to integrate, better visualization tools (Tableau) and record editing (CornEdit)

In short we hope that these changes will both improve communication and expectation setting on the project as well as make your jobs of assessing, planning, coding and cleaning much easier and smoother. To get a more detailed idea what these changes entail and why we’re making them, you can take a look at the recording (Passcode: iP+LHc9T) of our previous weekly meeting, the accompanying slides or this website!



September 9, 2021




Want to keep track of all the events that are happening at CoronaNet? Check out our new event calendar including all upcoming events like coding hours, end-date-a-thons, ask your PIs sessions and much more!

You can also find this calendar under the Communication tab on the Main Dashboard.



September 9, 2021




We’re excited to announce the first upcoming events this fall!! Mark your calenders for:

  • The COVID-19 Public Health and Social Measures (PHSMs) Research Outcome Conference, which brings together all COVID-19 policy trackers and scholars to discuss findings on COVID-19. Thanks for everyone who submitted their work and we’re looking forward to seeing all of you there on October 5-6, 2021.

  • We’ll have an End-Date-O-Ween on October 31, 2021 hosted by @Tasia. Come hang out and code end dates together in the hang out room! Show up in a costume to get extra points!

  • Ask Your PIs is coming back! Ask us all you ever wanted to know and stuff you probably didn’t want to know at the end of the weekly meetings. Next week, September 15, from 5pm onwards we have our very own @Caress Schenk with us!



September 9, 2021




We know you’ve all been working hard coding policies for your region and we’d love to learn about what is happening there! We’re looking for volunteers to spend 5 minutes giving us the downlow on the crazy things happening in your region. For this, we have prepared a pool of questions and you can choose up to three of them for presenting your country snapshot. If you are interested in participating, reach out to @Tasia on Slack for more details!



September 6, 2021




WE ARE BACK! We hope everyone has had a nice summer break and are excited for the many upcoming events in the following months. Thanks for all your work and dedication on this project; there would be no data without this amazing community, excited to see what we can do together in the fall!

(Meme credit goes to Rohan Bhavikatti)



August 16, 2021





Almost three months have passed and it is time for your input again! Please make sure to fill out the RA Internal Survey for every country you are coding for which asks you about the state of the data AND the Well Being Survey which asks you anonymously about your experience and satisfaction with the project.

Please try to fill out these surveys by this Friday, August 23!! They are really important because they help us get a better sense of where the data is, and thus how we should plan for future data collection and they also help us get a better sense of how you are all doing and what we could improve/do better. All of your input is incredibly valuable to making sure we’re all doing the best we can!!



August 16, 2021





Before we head off on our two week break, we will have our CoronaNet Summer Slumber Party next Friday from 2-6pm CEST where we will play games, watch movies and in general just have fun! Let’s relax, have some fun together and celebrate the amazing work we are all doing. We hope that you can join us in the the community hangout room (Password: 12345) and look forward to meeting more of you there!



July 27, 2021





As you all know, we’re in it for the long haul and its important to take breaks to relax, refresh and get reinvigorated. This is why we are planning a two-week project break from August 23rd to September 3rd. You’ve all been doing an amazing job assessing, planning, coding and cleaning policies; some of you for more than a year at this point; and if anyone deserves a vacation its you!



July 27, 2021



Join the community hangout room (Password: 12345) on August 4th from 5-8pm CEST for the End-date-Olympics to code end dates and watch the closing ceremony of the Olympics together!



July 21, 2021



We hit the milestone of 80,000 policies this week - great work everyone! Without your amazing effort and engagement, this would not have been possible, thanks to all of you!!



July 12, 2021



Have you wanted to have a cool way to show the work you’ve done on the project? Well now you have that chance! We are happy to introduce our new badges and titles! There are three levels that you can work toward:



Put the title on your CV, add the specific badge to your status on slack, and have them on your official CoronaNet certificate!



July 05, 2021



Did you ever have a suggestion or comment you wanted to make but didn’t want to wait until the next well-being survey or you didn’t feel comfortable bringing the issue up with your manager or in the general meeting?

Introducing the Anonymous Comment Box for your positive, negative or neutral feedback!

Only the prefects have access to the raw responses and including your name is optional, but if you are bringing up an issue that you would like our help solving please include your name so we can help.



May 26, 2021



The End-Date-A-Thon Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back is coming on June 4, 2020 12pm CET to June 5, 12pm CET. Come join us for an hour or two to clean missing end dates, meet new people on the project and have fun! Collective prizes/rewards for every 500 policies cleaned (e.g. the PIs will wear funny hats to the next weekly meeting)



May 19, 2021



We care about your well-being. Please take the mandatory Well-Being survey here by June 1st so we can get a better idea of how you are all doing (and earn an additional 5 Hogwarts points as well!)



May 19, 2021



The End-Date-A-Thon Episode V: Empire Strikes Back is coming soon! Please take the doodle here by May 26, 2021 so we can find a time that works best for everyone



April 27, 2021



We will host two (identical) coordinating sessions to accommodate as many people as possible:

  • Session 1: Thursday April 29 from 10am-11pm CET, meeting link here (Passcode: 821783) hosted by Svanhildur
  • Session 2: Thursday April 29, 4pm - 5pm CET, meeting link here (Passcode: 699940) hosted by Cindy

Feel free to join if you have time to learn more about how you can help out (or just about the event itself) — if you didn’t take the doodle poll, a heads up beforehand to Svanhildur or I would be appreciated but not necessary.



April 22, 2021



Our first ever End-Date-A-Thon will take place 12pm CET April 30 to 12pm CET May 1st. We’re making this a 24 hour event so that people from all the time zones can participate. Come join us for an hour or two to code missing end dates together, meet other people on the project and have fun! In the sign up sheet for the end-date-of-thon you will see that we are organising the day into:

  • 4 hour blocks:

    • First hour is intro to the event/Q&A
    • Second hour is music/coding hour
    • Third hour is social hour
    • Fourth hour is a wild card hour
  • Goals/rewards

    • Goals from 500, 1000, 1500, 2000 …. etc. missing end dates fixed: every 500 is another ‘milestone’
    • Prizes and Awards for every milestone (like getting the PIs to sing a silly song, more details soon) !
  • We will run updates on the numbers on how we’re progressing as fast as we can run the pipeline, (likely every two hours)

  • Happy for feedback on how to make this as fun as possible! —> let us know on Slack or feel free to enter in your suggestions in the ‘Additional ideas’ column in the sign up sheet above

  • No need to sign up to participate — the sign up sheet is mostly so that we can get an idea of how many people are interested and plan accordingly

We’re also looking for people to help host some events. If you’re interested in helping out (or just learning more about the event) please write down your name under the ‘Event Host Sign Up’ in the sign up sheet above and take this doodle so that we can find the best time together on Thursday April 29 to have a coordination meeting.



April 19, 2021



Have trouble finding reputable sources for coding policies in your country? Are NGOs/IO’s stepping in to address many of the pandemic’s effects? Join the CoronaNet Low State Capacity Workshop at 5pm CET on April 23 to discuss these issues. DM Cindy for more details!



April 13, 2021



Curious about what the PIs at CoronaNet do? Don’t miss the ‘Ask Your PI’ session which we will have during our weekly general meetings which take place every Wednesday at 4:30 CET. Mark your calendars for the following ‘Ask Your PI’ sessions:

  • April 14: Allison Hartnett
  • April 28: Joan Barceló
  • May 05: Bob Kubinec



March 31, 2021



Please join us for our 1-year Anniversary party on April 2, 4-8pm CET for games, music and celebration of CoronaNet RAs! The event will be held in the CoronaNet Community Hangout Room (Password: 12345)



March 31, 2021



Co-PI Dr. Allison Spencer Hartnett will be hosting a [stress and time management workshop] on April 5, 9am PST/6pm CET. Go to the Slack #general channel for the link and password!



March 12, 2021



We hit a milestone of 60,000 policies this week — amazing work everyone!



March 12, 2021



The project is getting more and more visibility. The Oxford tracker gives us a big shoutout in their new publication in Nature Human Behaviour and we also got a nice mention in an article by Nature news.



March 12, 2021



Remember time zone changes are coming!!! Please be mindful/double check the times when scheduling meetings and attending the weekly meeting



March 12, 2021



The COVID-19 PHSMS Data Coverage conference that we had last week was a great success, thanks so much again to everyone who came out and especially to Annika Kaiser, Ezgi Caki, Klea Vogli, Maryam AlHammadi and Vanessa Zwisele for their help and support to make it happen. We will be piloting initiatives to integrate data from other datasets country by country and we’ll see how it goes; unless we tap you on the shoulder for this, just sit tight and don’t worry too much about it.



March 9, 2021



Please be aware that WE UPDATED OUR WEEKLY MEETING ZOOM LINK Password: CoronaNet



March 8, 2021



Join our ‘Back to the 80s’ party today between 5-7pm CET on March 12 in the Community Hangout Room (Password: 12345); DJ Lucky Luca will be playing hits from the Reagan years!



March 1, 2021



CoronaNet Code of Conduct: As announced in the weekly meeting last week, with more than 600 RAs working on collecting data on government responses to COVID-19, it is crucial that we treat each other with respect. Please read the CoronaNet Code of Conduct which provides a framework for how RAs are expected to treat each other and what they can do if they experience a problem. Thanks in particular to the Hogwarts prefects for taking the lead on this



February 26, 2021



Join our 90s party today between 6-8pm CET in the Community Hangout Room (Password: 12345); DJ Lucky Luca will play hot decks from the 90s and you can also request a song.

Project Goals

Overall Project Goal:

The overall project goal is to gather complete and clean data for all countries

The time period for which we aim to collect complete and clean data will be different depending on whether a country is a spotlight country or a capsule country and whether subantional data collection is involved:

Spotlight national and subnational countries: Document policies made up until 10/2021 (hard goal)

  • EU27 Countries + Eurasia + Senegal
    • Austria, Belgium, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Senegal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan
    • Subnational data collection for bolded countries

Capsule National Countries: Document policies made up until 03/2021 (hard goal) + 10/2021 (soft goal)

  • Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brunei, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cambodia, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, Colombia, Comoros, Costa Rica, Cuba, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gabon, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Hong Kong, Iceland, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Ivory Coast, Jamaica, Jordan, Kenya, Kiribati, Kosovo, Kuwait, Laos, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Liechtenstein, Macau, Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Mauritius, Micronesia, Moldova, Monaco, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Namibia, Nauru, Nepal, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Niger, North Korea, North Macedonia, Northern Cyprus, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Palau, Paletsine, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Qatar, Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Samoa, San Marino, Sao Tome and Principe, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Solomon Islands, Somalia, South Africa, South Korea, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Syria, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Timor Leste, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Tuvalu, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Uruguay, Vanuatu, Vatican, Venezuela, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Capsule Subnational Countries: Document policies made up until 10/2020 (hard goal) + 10/2021 (soft goal)

* Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, India, Japan, Mexico, Nigeria, Switzerland, United States


For more information, please see the Project Goals page!


Coding Focus

  • Make sure the end dates are filled
  • Check out our new question on end dates here as well a video explaining how to fix them!
  • Identify missing end dates for your country here
  • See the ‘How do I code end dates’ section in the Coding Guide for guidance

What Policy Types to prioritize:

Group 1

  • Lockdown
  • Curfew
  • Quarantine

Group 2:

  • External Border Restrictions
  • Internal Border Restrictins

Group 3:

  • Restrictions of Mass Gatherings
  • Social Distancing

Group 4

  • Closure and Regulation of Schools
  • Restrictions and Regulations of Businesses
  • Restrictions and Regulations of Government Services

Group 5:

  • Health Monitoring
  • Health Testing
  • Health Resources
  • Hygiene

Group 6:

  • Declaration of Emergencies
  • New Task Forces
  • Public Awareness Measures
  • Anti-disinformation Measures

Group 7:

  • COVID-19 Vaccines

Weekly Competitions

House Cup Competition

In our weekly house cup competition which ends at 3pm CET every Wednesday, RAs in different houses compete by earning Hogwarts points for the following:

  • 1-2 points per entry for participating in the weekly competition in the #random channel
  • 2 points for attending the general project-wide weekly meetings
  • 2 points for having your camera on during the general project-wide weekly meeting
  • 2 points for having a virtual background during the general project-wide weekly meeting
  • 1 point for asking a question during the general project-wide weekly meeting
  • 2 points for retweeting or resharing CoronaNet social media posts
  • 3-4 points for attending regional weekly meetings
  • 10 - 15 points for filling out the data checklist (look under ‘Organization’ section in the ‘Main Dashboard’)
  • 15 - 20 points for filling out the country overiew
  • 15 - 20 points for filing out the timeline template
  • Up to 20 extra points per week (helping other RAs, answering questions on ra-chat, etc.)

Winning houses get the honor of picking the song that plays at the beginning of our general project-wide weekly meetings which are held at 4:30pm CET every Wednesday. May the best house win!


Missing End Dates Competition

In this weekly missing end dates competition, which runs until Tuesday every week (the winner announced at our Wednesday general project-wide weekly meetings), RAs in different houses compete based on the number of missing end dates they can correct.

What is this competition?

We noticed that many people were having difficulty filling in the end dates for their policies because sometimes it is not straightforward. What is the end date for a policy which distributes mask? What is the end date for a policy that recommends handwashing?

To address this difficulty, we created a new variable: [date_end_spec] (see Coding Guide and the ‘How do I code end dates?’ tab for more information), which allows RA’s to choose between the following options:

  • The policy has a clear end date
  • The policy is a one-time measure (e.g. publication of guidelines, instead of selecting the same start & end date)
  • The policy has an unlimited time span (e.g. recommendations to wash one’s hands; law amendments)
  • The policy has an imprecise natural end date (e.g. masks will be distributed until they run out)
  • policy’s end date is unknown or unreported

How to participate:

To participate, you can correct/backcode policies that were coded before we introduced this [date_end_spec] variable.

  • Find policies in your region that are missing end dates here
  • Lean how to correct/backcode these policies in this short video!

Rules:

Winning houses are selected based on the following formula: the number of missing end dates filled + The number of people filling in end dates * 2.

Note: its possible to win even if your house doesn’t correct the most number of policies as long as you have a lot of people helping to do it —> this is a truly a team effort and we want to reward houses that pull their weight together!!

Winning houses get the honor of having a poem dedicated to them at our general project-wide weekly meetings

Side competiton: If at least 33% of a house participates in the competition for a given week, the house can choose the icon for the slack channel for the week (and if more than one house reaches this goal in a given week, then the winner is the one that has more people). We hope that this can be a special unicorn of a competition that happens once in a while to give recognition to houses that pull their weight together

Main Dashboard

Row

Coding Resources

How to …

Assess the policies in your country

Make a plan for coding

Get started with coding

Clean policies in your country


Get help with assessing, planning, coding and cleaning the data for your region!

Don’t hesitate to ask questions! If you have them you can…

  1. Refer to the Codebook for variable definitions
  2. Check out the Coding Guide for examples of how to code corrections, updates and policy types
  3. Check out the FAQ in the Shiny App! It is updated weekly with the most common questions posed on #ra-chat
  4. Don’t see your question there? Post it in the #ra-chat channel.
  5. Reach out to your regional mangager, hogwarts channel or fellow RAs for advice


General Resources

Watch our training video for assessing, planning, coding and cleaning!

In this Oct 1 Training Video (Passcode: f5G6^AY7) we go over the rationale for assessing, planning, coding and cleaning. We also provide an overview of the new tools available on this dashboard in order to do so, including the :

CoronaNet Manual

This is the ‘Bible’ of the CoronaNet Project

  • You can learn about all the different parts of the project in detail from reading the Manual.

Coronanet Data Collection and Guidelines

  • You can learn about the different resources to find policies, updates to the codebook and variable defintions here!

CoronaNet Coding Guide

  • You can learn about how to code corrections, updates and different policy types here!

CoronaNet Skeleton

  • Confused as to how a policy should look? Check out how in theory the data should look like and examples of ‘clean’ data here!

CoronaNet RA Onboarding Document

  • Overwhelmed by all the material on this dashboard? Check out the CoronaNet RA Onboarding document to get a quick but substantive overview of the different parts of the project

CoronaNet Low State Capacity Guidelines

CoronaNet Policy Predictor

  • Unsure how to code a policy? Joseph Shim has created a great new tool that provides a model-based best ‘guess’ of a policy based on the policy description. These model-based predictions will continue to improve i) based on your feedback (reach out to Joseph or Cindy!) and ii) as the overall data becomes cleaner and cleaner. We hope this can be an additional resource to asking your fellow RAs, regional/country managers, #ra-chat etc. on your way to taxonomy mastery!

CoronaNet Duplicate Detector

  • Wondering whether a policy you are about to code is already in the dataset? Abdul Ali Khan has created an amazing new tool that provides an automated check for duplicates based on a policy description. We hope this can be an additional resource to help you in your coding and prevent duplicates in the future!

Bulk Access

All videos

  • Access all videos that have been created for CoronaNet’s YouTube Channel here!

All documents and sheets

  • Access all Google docs and Google Sheets in the CoronaNet Google drive here!


Tools Resources

Overton Raw Sources

How to use the Overton Raw Sources

Overton is a company which collects government documents from around the world and which has generously allowed us to access to raw government documents related to COVID-19.

  • To find relevant documents for your country, please click on the corresponding URL in the ‘Country List’ front page of the Overton Raw Sources sheet.

  • The documents listed in the Overton Raw Sources sheet are scraped from the Overton site. They provide a useful reference point for:

    • Checking whether all government policies related to COVID-19 in your country are coded.
    • Providing additional sources for where to find information about COVID-19 polcies in a particular country. If it is not already noted, feel free to note such sources in the relevant ‘General Country Information’ link found in your respective regional or country dashbbaord.
  • The Overton Raw Sources sheet will be updated weekly.

  • Caveats:

    • Note that the list provided by Overton is not a definitive list of all COVID-19 related policies but provide a strong foundation for finding and verifying the existence of COVID-19 policies in a particular country.
    • Note that not all documents listed in the Overton Raw Sources sheet may be relevant to code for the CoronaNet Project.
    • In addition note Overton does not cover all countries.

Jataware/Starsift Raw Sources

How to use the Jataware/Starsift Raw Sources

Jataware/Starsift is a company which has scraped the web for news articlesrelated to COVID-19.

  • To find relevant documents for your country, please click on the corresponding URL in the ‘COVID-19 Directory’ front page of the Jataware/Starsift Raw Sources sheet.

  • The news articles listed in the Jataware/Starsift Raw Sources sheet are scraped from the web. They provide a useful reference point for:

    • Checking whether all government policies related to COVID-19 in your country are coded.
    • Providing additional sources for where to find information about COVID-19 polcies in a particular country. If it is not already noted, feel free to note such sources in the relevant ‘General Country Information’ link found in your respective regional or country dashbbaord.
  • Jataware/Starsift stopped data collection for news related to COVID-19 in August 2020; thus their links can only provide information for dates prior to August 2020.

  • Caveats:

    • Note that when possible, it is best to use a government source as the basis for coding a policy and for this reason, the government documents provided by Overton may be more helpful. However when there are no government documents available, then it is fine to document a policy if you use at least 2 news sources to substantiate it and the Jatware/Starsift database may be helpful in this regard
    • Note that the list provided by Jataware/Starsift is not a definitive list of all COVID-19 related policies but provide a strong foundation for finding and verifying the existence of COVID-19 policies in a particular country.
    • Note that not all documents listed in the Jataware/Starsift Raw Sources sheet may be relevant to code for the CoronaNet Project.

Policy Checker Sheet

How to Use the Policy Checker Sheet

The Policy Checker Sheet checks the CoronaNet data against the WHO PHSM Dataset. The sheet will be updated semi-regularly as the WHO PHSM dataset itself is updated.

  • The sheet is organized by region and policy type, with one sheet per region

  • Caveats:

    • Note that WHO PHSM dataset does not provide definitive list of all COVID-19 related policies but provide a strong foundation for finding and verifying the existence of COVID-19 policies in a particular country.
    • Note that it is possible that some policies in the Policy Checker Sheet is miscoded. For example, a policy listed in the ‘Quarantine’ tab, may actually be about ‘Lockdown’ and not quarantine. In these cases, please code the policy that makes sense for the CoronaNet database, not what is indicated in the Policy Checker Sheet.

Qualtrics Survey

How to access the Qualtrics Survey

  • You will receive access to the Qualtrics survey after having passed the training test and filling out the committment form
  • Every RA receives a personalized link to the Qualtrics survey
  • Please contact if you have not recieved access to the survey (note, there may be a lag of a few days before you receive access)

What’s in the Qualtrics Survey?

CoronaNet Training Survey Answer Key

  • Before joining the project, you were asked to pass the training survey to make sure you know how to use the Qualtrics survey to collect data on governments’ COVID-19 policies.
  • Take a look through the answers in the CoronaNet Training Survey Answer Key

Shiny App

How to Access the Shiny App

  • You need an email invitation to access the Shiny App
  • If you have not received an email invitation/have a problem with your invite, please post your issue on the shiny app channel
  • Check your spam folders for such an invitation
  • If you have never received an invitation, post in the #shinyapp and someone will add you

How to use the Shiny App

What else is on Shiny App?

  • You can also use the Shiny App for making corrections. Note that it takes 24 hours for the corrections to enter into the database.
  • Check out the FAQs on the Shiny App for a summary of the questions asked on #ra-chat!


CoronaNet Data Previously Uploaded PDFs

How to use CoronaNet’s Previously Uploaded PDFs

These are the pdfs of policies that have already been documented in the CoronaNet database. You can use these pdfs to:

  • Get a clearer sense of the policy history in your country/region
  • Help you clean or correct incomplete or incorrectly coded policies

The relevant links to the pdfs are in the ‘download link 1’ or ‘download link 2’ columns for each country or region. You can also access the pdfs for your country or region in your country or regional dashbaord under the heading ‘Primary Sources for Old Policies’

Delete a Policy

When to delete a policy

  • There are duplicate policies
  • It is easier to delete a policy and start over than to correct it
  • The policy does not belong in the dataset

Slack

What is Slack?

  • Slack is the main tool that CoronaNet members use to communicate with each other
  • Explore different functionalities in Slack here!
  • Aside from your regional or country channel, the most relevant channels in slack are #ra-chat (where you can ask all your coding questions), #random (where you can participate in weekly Hogwarts contests), #ra-suggestions (where you can provide suggestions for how to improve the Qualtrics survey), and #general (where you can get and post general information of general interst)

Organization Resources

How to fill out the Regional/Country Data Checklist

Templates

How to fill out the Country Overview

How to use the Timeline Template

Communication

Within the Project

CoronaNet Spotify Playlists

Titles and Badges

  • We want to acknowledge all the amazing work you have done for the project and recognize the many hours you have put into collecting data on COVID-19 government responses. We are happy to introduce badges and titles!
    • There are three levels that you can work toward:



    • Get your CoronaNet badge and title! You can put them on your CV, add the specific badge to your status on Slack, and have them on your official CoronaNet certificate.
    • To find out which title you have earned at CoronaNet so far, please check out this list which will be updated on a weekly basis!

Anonymous Comment Box

  • We want this project to be the best for all of you and we can only get better by your feedback.
    • Give us your positive, negative, and neutral feedback via the Anonymous Comment Box!
    • Only the prefects have access to the raw responses and including your name is optional. If you are bringing up an issue that you would like our help solving please include your name so we can help.
    • If you have additional questions about how this box works, do not hesitate to reach out to the prefects!

CoronaNet Event Calendar

  • Want to keep track of all the events that are happening at CoronaNet?
    • Check out the CoronaNet Event Calendar including all upcoming events like coding hours, end-date-a-thons, ask your PIs sessions and much more!
    • If you have additional questions about any event or want to host one yourself, do not hesitate to reach out to @Cindy Cheng or the prefects!

How to get more involved

  • Get your country/region clean and up to date until the present day and not just October 1st
    • Help with coding another country (ask your country/regional manager or project manager for this).

    • Help out with the management of the project by becoming a regional or country manager or a Hogwarts prefect (ask your country/regional manager or project manager about this).

    • Join the Data validation team! Contact Klea Vogli or project management

    • Join the Data Cleaning team! Contact Karina Lisboa Båsund or project management

    • Take a look at the CoronaNet Task Sign-Up Sheet for discrete tasks that need to be done, and contact the relevant person under the ‘Contact’ column with the task you’re interested in and the relevant skills that you have

Code of Conduct

  • With more than 600 RAs working together to collect data on government policies mad in response to COVID-19, it is crucial that we treat each other with respect. Please read the CoronaNet Code of Conduct for guidelines on how to interact with other RAs on the project and how you can reach out if you experience a problem.


On Slack

Find out what all the different channels are.

If you do not have access to some of them, please contact your regional or country manager and s/he can add you or Saif Khan or Vanesa Zwisele.

#ra-chat

  • This is the main channel to ask your coding questions, don’t be shy! Ask them in #ra-chat

  • A summary of all the previously asked questions can be found in the FAQ section in the Shiny App

#shinyapp

  • This is the main channel to report any problems that you’ve been having with the shiny app #ra-chat
  • Note, if you’re experiencing issues, please note the policy_ids or record_ids associated with your issue so that we can identify and solve your problem!

  • #general

    Announcements about updates or changes to the project are posted in the #general channel. Also feel free to post information about events or research opportunities relevent to COVID-19

    #random

    Participate in the weekly Hogwarts competiton or just post random stuff that you’re interested in in the #random channel!

    #ra-suggestions

    Have a suggestion on how to improve the survey or the project? We’d love to hear from you, post it in the #ra-suggestions channel!

    #orphaned-records

    Find a policy that is an update but isn’t connected to a new entry? Post your problem in the #orphaned-records channel!
    #research-ideas Have a research idea and looking for feedback or for a collaborator? Post in the #research-ideas channel!

    Claim your title and get your badge!

    Have you wanted to have a cool way to show the work you’ve done on the project? Well now you have that chance with our new badges and titles!


    Add the specific badge to your status on Slack and show your experience and expertise!


    Certificates

    Get your certificate for your work at CoronaNet! We want to recognize all the amazing work you have done for the project and the many hours you have spent researching and coding policies into the CoronaNet dataset. Therefore, we are more than happy to provide you with an individualized Certificate of Appreciation which you can retrieve from here! This certificate includes all your responsibilities you have had during your time at CoronaNet and will be updated automatically on a regular basis.
    If you have any questions or specific requests concerning the certificates, do not hesitate to reach out to the Project Management Team via email () or on Slack!


    Our public profile


    Saying goodbye? Before you go…

    1. Please make sure to contact your regional manager to let them know that you’ll be leaving
    2. Make sure you fill out an Exit Report before you go!
      • The exit report is important to pass on information so that the next RA has a better idea of what’s going on in your region and what should be done (see this short video for more instructions). You can send your exit report to . Please use this standard file name: [ra_name][country_name][date]_exitreport.docx.
      • For regional and country managers, we have created a regional and country manager exit report template which we hope you will fill out and pass on to the next regional or country manager to fill your position!
      • If you have other any useful information about your country that you would like to pass on, please email them to .
    3. Lastly, please fill out this exit survey to let us know about your experience with us and how we can do better!

    Skills Building

    CoronaNet Working Paper Series

    Interested in building your research skills? Get involved with the CoronaNet Working Paper Series! Visit the CoronaNet Working Paper Series website to learn more.

    … how to write an academic paper

    • Check out this workshop on academic writing organized by and led by Professor Caress Schenk! (Video) Passcode: +?.S3%3e

    … how to formulate a research question

    • Check out this workshop on how to formulate a research question organized and led by Luca Messerschmidt! (Video) Passcode: PYUyfC4$

    … learn about different research methods and research design

    • Check out this workshop on what research methods are out there and what is the most appropriate to use for your research question, led by Dr. Tim Model (Video)

    … how to analyze CoronaNet data in R

    • Check out this workshop on how to use R to analyze the data you’re collecting for Coronanet! Led by Dr. Cindy Cheng (Video) (Password: 0?760zGU )


    Learn how to explore the CoronaNet data with R!

    • Check out the CoronaNet Learning Platform a tutorial that Luca Messerschmidt has put together which takes students through the basics of R in order to help people work with the CoronaNet data:

    How to pitch CoronaNet on your CV

    • Check out the workshop that Prof. Allison Hartnett held on how to write a CV in general and how to pitch your CoronaNet experience on it (Slides) (Video)

    Wondering whether to pursue a PhD?

    • Check out this info session (Password: 3w#GmNJ7) that Dr. Cindy Cheng held on pursuing a PhD

    Incoming RAs

    There is a lot of information to absorb for this project. This dashboard provides a guideline for what materials new RAs should look at and in what order in order to making the onboarding process as smooth as possible. Note:

    Row

    Getting started

    You’ve just gone through the onboarding process and you don’t know where to begin?

    After this, you can look at the ‘Week 1’ tab for our suggestions on what you can do next. Before you do that though, please make sure that you…


    Have gone through all the training that you should have before being onboarded:


    Have access to…

       If you don’t have access to these items, please see the ‘Tools Resources’ chart in the ‘Main Dashboard’ for instructions on how to get access


    Have had contact with…

    • Your country or regional manager (check the regional dashboards to see who is your country manager)
    • Your Hogwarts prefect (you should have been sorted into a house, if not please post on the #general channel and someone will sort you!)

    Find out what all the different channels are.

    If you do not have access to some of them, please contact your regional or country manager and s/he can add you or Saif Khan, Stella Kim or Vanesa Zwisele.

    #ra-chat

    • This is the main channel to ask your coding questions, don’t be shy! Ask them in #ra-chat

    • A summary of all the previously asked questions can be found in the FAQ section in the Shiny App

    #general

    Announcements about updates or changes to the project are posted in the #general channel. Also feel free to post information about events or research opportunities relevent to COVID-19

    #random

    Participate in the weekly Hogwarts competiton or just post random stuff that you’re interested in in the #random channel!

    #ra-suggestions

    Have a suggestion on how to improve the survey or the project? We’d love to hear from you, post it in the #ra-suggestions channel!

    #orphaned-records

    Find a policy that is an update but isn’t connected to a new entry? Post your problem in the #orphaned-records channel!
    #research-ideas Have a research idea and looking for feedback or for a collaborator? Post in the #research-ideas channel!

    Week 1

    Welcome to your first offical week on the project! We’re so excited to have you on board. Please make sure that you have all gone through everything in the ‘Getting started’ tab. In this tab, we provide some guidelines on the materials you should know or have access to as well as the things you should do by the end of week 1:


    What you should know…

    Take the time to familiarize yourself with the state of the data for your country and or region. This involves knowing …

    …what policies for your country and region are already coded in the CoronaNet Database

    • You can use the The Shiny App to find out what has already been coded in your country or region.

    …what policies there are still left to code for your country or region in the CoronaNet Database

    • If the previous RA for your country or region has left any useful information about policies in your country or region, you can find it in the ‘RA Materials’ section in your country or regional dashboard. See the ‘How to Access RA Materials’ instructions in your country or regional dashboard to access them.
    • If a previous RA didn’t leave anything that doesn’t mean the country is all coded! In this case, you will have to do some legwork in finding out if there are other policies to code (see below)

    …how to find new/more policies for your country or region

    • You can look in the ‘General Country Information’ tab in your regional or country dashboard to see if the previous RA has left any specific information on which government ministries to keep an eye on for finding out information about COVID-19 policies

    • You can check the CoronaNet Data Collection Guidelines and Codebook ‘Data Sources’ section to get ideas about how to find policies for your country

    • You can check out the Overton Raw Sources to see if there is information about policies in your country there. Look under ‘Tool Resources’ in the main dashboard for more information on what Overton is and how to use their sources

    • You can check out the Starsift/Jataware Raw Sources to see if there is information about policies in your country there. Look under ‘Tool Resources’ in the main dashboard for more information on what Overton is and how to use their sources

    • You can check out the Policy Checker Sheet to see if there is information about policies in your country there. Look under ‘Tool Resources’ in the main dashboard to find out how to use the Policy Checker Sheet


    What you should do

    Once you get a general overview of the state of the CoronaNet data in your country, as well as what potential sources you still need to code, and where to find information on policies not yet coded, then focus on:

    • Creating a country overview targeted toward the specific policies that we are concentrating on in the project for that week (you can find out which policies these are from ‘Goal for this week’ in the sidebar of the main dashboard) unless asked to do otherwise by your regional or country manager.
    • You might also find it helpful to create a timeline for your region’s policies as well.


    Have had contact with…

    • Your regional or country manager to get feedback on your country overview or timeline

    Week 2

    By the end of week 1 you should have created a country overview and/or timeline targeted toward a few policies. Make sure that you consult with your regional or country manager before coding these policies into Qualtrics. Please see the tab for ‘Week 1’ if you’re having trouble figuring out how to get started with creating the country overview. In this tab, we provide some guidelines on the materials you should know or have access to as well as the things you should do by the end of week 2:


    What you should know…

    Take the time to get to know the Qualtrics survey and how to code certain policies into the survey. Note that if you are taking over for a previous RA, it may be the case that instead of coding new policies, you are instead correcting old ones. We have some resources to help you out how to do both! Including…

    • Not sure what the universe of policies there are in the survey? The Policy Sub-Type Expansion has them all in one place. Be sure to cross-reference the CoronaNet Data Collection Guidelines and Codebook ‘Variable Definitions’ section for more examples of each policy type as well as definitions for other dimensions of the data
    • Coding Guide: This is hands-down the best tool that you can use to figure out how a policy should be coded once you’ve figured out the policy type that it should be coded under


    What you should do…

    Once you’ve had the time to get a lay of the land for a few policies, its time to start filling out the data checklist! If you are coding for a country, you can find the relevant checklist for you country in the Regional Data Checklist. If you are coding for a subnational region within a country that has a country manager, please fill out the relevant country data checklist which you can find in the ‘Organization’ tab on the main dashboard.

    For help on how to fill out this checklist, you can check out the following:


    Have had contact with…

    • Your regional or country manager to get feedback on filling out the data checklist

    For the coming weeks, you should engage in the same process to assess, plan, code and clean all the other policies made in your country. Gradually, you should get to the point where you can be filling out the data checklist for a few policies at a time each week.

    General RA Responsibilities

    • Attend the Weekly Meetings on Wednesday, 4:30 CET if its reasonably possible to do to learn about how the project is changing. The success of this project depends on communication and coordination and the more you can participate, the better we can do both.
    • Attend your regional or country manager meetings or office hours
    • Keep up to date with the policies in your country, focusing on the policies that will be listed on the sidebar of the Main dashboard each week
    • Fill out the data checklist each week for the policies that we are focusing on that week (feel free to fill them out for more policies too if you’d like!)
    • Help us build as much institutional knowledge as possible about how countries make policies. This includes uploading your country overviews and templates into the ‘RA Materials’ tab as well as filling out the ‘General Country Information’ tab for your country or region so that we can share knowledge about where the best sources of information are for particular countries

    All of the responsibilities listed above have something to do with communication. If the work becomes too much for you and/or if you need some help, that is totally fine! The important thing is that you just let us know. By that same token, if you need a break please contact your regional or country manager to let him/her know. Similarly, if you need to leave the project, then please do the same and also take the time to fill out an exit report and exit survey (you can find out more about both in the ‘Communications’ tab in the main dashboard.)

    Data Validation

    Column

    Data Validation

    Training Video

    • In this mandatory training video, we go over all you need to know about how to validate data!


    Validation Coding Zoom Session

    Timeline

    Slack Channel

    Q & A

    Contact People

    • @Allison
    • @Joan
    • @Klea

    Column

    Column

    Northern Africa

    Row

    General Country Information

    Row

    Primary Sources for Old Policies

    Eastern Africa

    Central Africa

    Southern Africa

    Western Africa

    Caribbean

    Central America

    South America

    Eurasia

    Eastern Asia

    Row

    General Country Information

    Southeast Asia

    South Asia

    Row

    Eastern Europe and Western Asia

    Northern Europe

    Southern Europe

    Western Europe

    Oceania

    Middle East

    USA

    Germany

    Italy

    France

    Brazil

    China

    India

    Nigeria

    Russia

    Row

    Japan

    Switzerland

    Spain